Allah knows the best: Finding truth in fact and fabrication!

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Finding truth in fact and fabrication

Ikim Views
By Mohamad Azhar Hashim Fellow, Centre for Economics and Social Studies

Many Muslim scholars are still debating the authenticity of the expression ‘seek knowledge even as far as China’. While Muslims continue to be divided on this, China is fast becoming the largest economy in the world.

WHILE Muslims are engaging in a long debate whether the expression, “seek knowledge even as far as China” is really the words of the Prophet or a hadith, China has already emerged as the second largest economy in the world.

Economic experts made it official early this year that China has surpassed Japan to become the world’s second largest economy.

Indeed, the huge nation cannot wait any longer for Muslims to resolve their nagging debate on the authenticity of the expression and other trivialities, as toppling the United States as the largest economy in the world is now within sight.

Today, China’s economy is the fastest growing in the world, with the output growth rate in its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growing consistently at an average 10% over the past 30 years.

China is currently the largest exporter and second largest importer of goods, as well as the world’s largest car market and the biggest energy consumer.

The significant growth in its investments, consumption and living standards is the result of its economic reforms initiated in the late 70s. The reforms have been successful in resolving poverty issues and driving China’s active participation in the global market.

China’s emergence in the world economy today not only has been made through the government but also through private companies.



Its currency, the renminbi or yuan, has become stronger and regarded as a benchmark currency for international transactions, especially on a regional basis.

Economic superpowers often feel threatened by the rising power of the yuan, accusing China that their currency brought about instability in the world trade.

For many years, Muslims have been debating on expression, whether it can be classified as authentic hadith or not. There were also disputes whether it was actually pronounced by the Prophet or just words of wisdom.

There have been differences in opinion. There are scholars who place this expression in the category of weak hadith (dhaeef), and there are also scholars who reject the expression as a hadith all together.

They opined that this expression was fabricated (mawdhu’) or fake words attributed to the Prophet, which means it was not the words of the Prophet at all, as there was no basis to claim so.

In addition, there are scholars who opined that even if this expression is an authentic hadith, it does not mean that there is an obligation for Muslims to seek knowledge in China in the literal sense.

In essence, Muslims are urged to seek knowledge related to Syariah or religious knowledge, even if it takes a person to faraway lands.

These opinions over the years may have had a psychological impact on Muslims, both in pursuing the type of knowledge and the position of China.

Muslims scholars may have found the truth that the expression is not from the Prophet, based on their study in the knowledge of hadith. As laymen, we are obliged to uphold and respect the opinion of the scholars.

However, imagine if Muslims did not engage in the debate on the authenticity of the expression but instead, acknowledge it, and act accordingly to the explicit intention of the message contained in the expression.

Who knows, today Muslims may have done well economically, and may have dominated the world economy in ways that could be superior than present advanced economies.

Whoever uttered or designed or fabricated the expression, “seek knowledge even as far as China” centuries ago, he was wise, as he probably saw the future vividly.

While Muslims have heard the expression for ages, and have been all the while arguing, debating and disputing it with different opinions, other nations have been building bridges with modern China and made an impact on the huge nation.

Indeed, China has successfully transformed its economy from an impoverished communist nation to an economic powerhouse. It has overtaken Europe and Japan, and is now set to take the number one position from the United States, which many economic experts believe can be achieved between 2020 and 2030.

While Muslims continue to embrace and subscribe to the words or expressions of wisdom of every visionary in the world without much hesitation, we still debate at length words of wisdom from visionaries of our rich intellectual civilisation. Only Allah knows best.

Moving to the next frontier of space programme

                      Image via Wikipedia

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MADE IN CHINA By CHOW HOW BAN

CHINA is moving in the right direction to build a 60-tonne space station around 2020.

On Nov 3, the unmanned Shenzhou 8 shuttle docked with Tiangong-1, which is China’s first space lab module, after travelling 343km in orbit.

The shuttle separated from the target spacecraft after 12 days and carried out its second docking on Nov 14. Two days later, Shenzhou 8 left Tiangong-1 and returned to Earth as scheduled.

News from the China Manned Space Engineering Office is that Tiangong-1 has continued its voyage at a height of 370km smoothly and transferred into a long-term operational mode.

The space lab module will wait for docking with the manned Shenzhou 9 and 10 sometime next year.

According to the office’s vice-director Wang Zhaoyao, during the flight of Shenzhou 8 its general biological experimental device functioned normally and 17 samples of Sino-Germany cooperative space life science experiments were recovered after the shuttle landed at the recovery site in Inner Mongolia.

He said Tiangong-1 had also carried out a series of experiments and tests as scheduled, including space-to-earth remote sensing exploration application experiment, space materials scientific experiment and space environment and physical detection tests.

“This space rendezvous and mission has fully realised its objective of ‘accurate entry into orbit, precise docking, stable assembly operation and safe return’.

“It marks a critical breakthrough for China’s space technology and set a milestone for our manned space development,” he told a press conference recently.

Wang said Tiangong-1, launched into orbit on Sept 29, was designed with a lifespan of more than two years and it would be well maintained until its following docking operations next year.

Under China’s space programme, after completing its first round of missions, Tiangong-1 will return to earth in 2013. It will be replaced by the larger Tiangong-2 and Tiangong-3 modules which will conduct more sophisticated space probes.



Tiangong-3 will probably be a 60-tonne full-size space station to be manned by astronauts.

The China’s Manned Space Engineering Office maintained that China is not working on the space station development alone and the country always welcomed other nations.

“We emphasise independent development but never said we want to develop in isolation. The development and operation of China’s space station are open to foreign colleagues and experts in the field on the principle of mutual respect and benefit, transparency and openness,” Wang said.

China has had fruitful space cooperation with Russia, Germany, France and other nations.

China would like to be involved in the building of the International Space Station together six other space agencies but because of various reasons, China remains excluded from the programme, he added.

He also refuted claims that China’s manned space programmes had military functions.

“We can say that none of the eight Shenzhou missions had direct military applications. But, we all know that space-related technological developments can be used in civilian and military sectors.

“For example, a communications satellite can be used for TV broadcasting and military communication. So it depends on what you use it for,” he added.

Wang hoped that critics would be responsible and fair when criticising China’s space programmes.

“The United States and some media have been criticising our space exploration programme and development saying is not transparent enough. First of all, they have to be fair in their comments.

“Last year, I accompanied Nasa administrator Charles Bolden for a tour of our space programme facilities, laboratories and launching centres in China. He was pleased on how transparent we were,” he said.

China’s space programme consists of three stages. Phase 1 saw the historic launch of the unmanned Shenzhou 1 shuttle in 1999 for missions to conduct space experiments. It was followed by the launch of Shenzhou 2, Shenzhou 3, Shenzhou 4, Shenzhou 5, Shenzhou 6 and Shenzhou 7.

The Shenzhou 7 mission, China’s third manned spacecraft, was the most historic when Chinese astronaut Zhai Zhigang became the first man from China to do a spacewalk on Sept 27, 2008. It marked a successful extra-vehicular activity (EVA) mission for China.

Phase 2 began with the launch of the Tiangong-1 space module. One of the main missions during this phase will be the docking of a manned space shuttle with the space lab.

The space programme administration will decide between Shenzhou 9 and 10 which one will be manned by China’s first female astronaut next year.

Related posts:

China's Great Leap to Space Industry 

China completes nation's first space docking 

China's space station program  

Recipe for innovation

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AirAsia CEO and others give you recipe for innovation

By LIZ LEE lizlee@thestar.com.my

KUALA LUMPUR: What fosters the spirit of innovation? The answers point to an encouraging environment and putting Malaysia into context, there is much to be done at the home, education and corporate levels to create an environment fertile for sowing the seeds of unconventional thinking.

That was the main take-away from the second Merdeka Award Roundtable last week, featuring group chief executive of AirAsia Bhd Tan Sri Tony Fernandes, Malaysian Invention and Design Society president Tan Sri Dr Augustine Ong Soon Hock and Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) vice-chancellor Prof Datuk Dr Zaini Ujang.

The award was founded by energy companies Petronas, ExxonMobil and Shell in 2007 where award recipients will receive a certificate and RM500,000 cash award for each of five categories.

“(Innovation) is not something you can teach or programme. It is creating a lot of little ecosystems to make sure (the environment is right) and culture does play a part in this,” Fernandes said, kicking off the discussion on “Cultivating a culture of innovation in challenging times.”

 

Sharing ideas: (from left) Zaini, Ong and Fernandes at the second Merdeka Award Roundtable. The discussion was hosted by Astro Awani’s Norina Yahya

Of the education system, Fernandes said the focus on books had overwhelmed the development in other areas that build thought leaders.

“When we look at some of the great leaders, they are all rounded. Our schools have lost a lot by focusing on academics only,” he said.

Fernandes believed that while the Government should foster innovation as well as trust the people and allow ideas, education is the key to take Malaysia to the next level. He opined that bringing back arts, culture and sport would change the way the future generation thinks.



“A successful education system should be about bringing out the best in children and giving them the ability to experiment and try all sorts of things and turn that raw diamond into a polished diamond,” he said.

As a parent, he believed that it was important to “expose the children to as many things as possible and allow them to go where they want.”

At the corporate level, he added that there was also a culture of subordination in Malaysia that hampered creative output: “When you go against the norm in Malaysia, you can be whacked. It's sometimes seen as insubordinate or questionable when you challenge the norm.”

“That's the culture. Malaysians are an innovative lot but sometimes we need to praise innovation by creating the environment,” he said, adding that the success stories of Malaysian innovation were not sung often enough.

“We don't hear enough of the success stories. A lot of our technology came from Malaysians and we need to show that the commercialisation of these ideas have come to fruition,” he said.

During the discussion, Fernandes also revealed that the flat structure in AirAsia's management was the “secret weapon” for its success in the industry. He said that communication flow relied on organisation structure.

“If you have a hierarchical organisation, the people who have ideas are sometimes too scared to speak up. (But) it's all right to give ideas, it's all right to talk,” he said of the potentially stifling hierarchical organisation structures in many Malaysian companies.

“I always say I would rather have 9,000 brains working with me than just 10,” he said, adding on that “if you create an environment where everyone feels equal and there's freedom of expression (among all levels of employees), that provides a very powerful machine.”

However, innovating per se should not be the end goal too.

Ong, who is also a former member of the Merdeka Award Health, Science and Technology Committee, said there needed to be market-driven innovations to encourage worthwhile creations.

“When you have innovation for a market that is not ready for it, that becomes a problem,” he said.

“We should also look at what our country has a niche in. We should concentrate on areas where we already have good industries going on where innovation can bring some results,” he added, saying that foreign areas like nuclear energy may not be an ideal area to innovate since the country had yet to develop its know-how and infrastructure.

In terms of getting academicians engaged with market-centric needs, Zaini said UTM had a professorship scheme with Proton Holdings Bhd where professors were positioned at the company to spur on-the-ground projects with the staff.

“We target to have 100 patents under Proton per year from this industrial PhD,” the former Merdeka Award recipient said, highlighting the university's market-relevant endeavours through the reverse flow of ideas from the market into academia.

The roundtable will be broadcast on Astro Awani in early December.